1 Corinthians 12:11Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Through Him we received the remission of sins. Through Him we washed away every impurity.

By His gift, we who ran to grace became angels from men. We were not changed in nature. Yet, what is far more wonderful, while remaining in human nature, we display angelic life.

Such is the power of the Holy Spirit.

As material fire, receiving soft clay, makes it into hard tile, so also the fire of the Spirit embraces a well-disposed soul. Even if He finds it softer than clay, He makes it harder than iron.

The one who had shortly before been defiled by the uncleanness of sin He suddenly reveals as brighter than the sun.

Teaching us this, blessed Paul cried out: "Do not be deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the Kingdom of God" (1 Cor 6:9-10).

After enumerating, so to speak, every kind of impiety, and teaching that those guilty of such sins are strangers to the Kingdom, he immediately added: "And such were some of you.

But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified." How and in what manner? Tell me, for this is the question.

"In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God" (1 Cor 6:11).

Do you see that the Holy Spirit destroyed all this impiety? Those who before were perishing by their own sins He suddenly raised to the highest honors.

"But one and the same Spirit works all these things" (1 Cor 12:11). The Spirit.

Here is the universal medicine of consolation. We all receive from one and the same root, from one and the same treasury, from one and the same source.

For this reason he continually uses this word. By it he levels the supposed inequality and gives consolation.

Earlier he said that the Spirit, the Son, and the Father bestow the gifts. Here he speaks only of the Spirit, so that from this also you may know that They have one and the same dignity.

Therefore, when we have been led up to this thought, again, using the God-inspired guidance, we are taught that although all things are brought from nonbeing into being by one Power, even this Power is not without source.

There is a certain Power existing unbegotten and without beginning. This Power is the cause of the cause and the cause of the cause of all beings.

For the Son is from the Father, through whom all things received being. With Him the Holy Spirit is always inseparably conceived.

No one can think of the Son without being first illumined by the Spirit.

Therefore the Holy Spirit, from whom every bestowal of good things pours forth upon creation, is united with the Son, with whom He is indivisibly contemplated.

He has His being dependent upon the cause, the Father, from whom He proceeds.

Thus the distinguishing mark of His hypostatic property is this: He is known after the Son and with the Son, and He has His being from the Father.

The Son, who through Himself and together with Himself makes known the Spirit who proceeds from the Father, alone shone forth in an only-begotten manner from the unbegotten Light.

According to His distinguishing marks, He has nothing in common with the Father or with the Holy Spirit, but He alone is known by the marks just mentioned.

And "God who is over all" alone has this preeminent mark of His hypostasis: He is Father, and His being is not from any cause. By this mark again He is properly known.

And just as dry wood, when watered, sends forth branches, so the sinful soul, having received the Holy Spirit through repentance, brings forth the fruits of righteousness.

For He is one and the same, yet by the will of God the Father, in the name of Christ, He produces various operations.

In one He turns the tongue to the word of wisdom. In another He enlightens the soul with prophecy. To another He gives power to cast out demons.

To another He gives the capacity to explain divine Scripture. He strengthens one in chastity, and teaches another mercy. He teaches one fasting and ascetic labors.

He teaches another contempt for what concerns the body. He prepares another for martyrdom. In others He produces other things, yet He is not different in Himself.

It confirmed that faith among the coarse and sensual Jews and Greeks of that time. When the faith of the Lord, through the apostolic preaching, had spread to all ends of the world and had taken possession of the world, this necessity passed. Therefore the manifest appearances of the Spirit of God were reduced, though they did not cease altogether.

According to blessed Theodoret, "these various gifts are like various streams, but the source is undoubtedly one," that is, the Holy Spirit, Who distributes them according to the strength of their bearers and according to His providence. Dwelling on this last thought, Saint John Chrysostom says: "As the Son says of the Father that He raises the dead and gives life, and likewise says of Himself that He gives life to whom He wills (Jn 5:21), so also of the Spirit it is said here that He works all things as He wills" (cf. 1 Cor 2:11).

And he not only comforts by this, but also stops the adversary's mouth with the words: distributing to each one as He wills. For in comforting, one must also instruct, as he does in the Epistle to the Romans, when he says, 'Who are you, O man, to answer back to God?' (Rom 9:20).

So also here: distributing by authority to each one as He wills. At the same time he shows that what belongs to the Father belongs also to the Spirit. For as he said of the Father, 'the same God who works all things in all,' so also of the Spirit: 'All these things are worked by one and the same Spirit.'

But, you will say, He works under the influence of God. The Apostle said this nowhere. You invent it yourself. When he says of God the Father, 'who works all things in all,' he says this of men. He does not in any way count the Spirit among men, even if you repeat it a thousand times like a madman.

Since he said above, 'through the Spirit' (dia tou Pneumatos, the word of wisdom is given), he adds this lest you think the expression implies the Spirit's abasement or the dependence of His actions on another. The Spirit works; He is not compelled to act. He works as He wills, not as He is commanded.

As the Son says of the Father that He raises the dead and gives life, and likewise says of Himself that 'He gives life to whom He wills' (Jn 5:21), so also of the Spirit it is said in one place that He does all things with authority, and nothing hinders Him.

For the words, 'He blows where He wills' (Jn 3:8), though spoken of the wind, prove this as well. Here it is said that He works all things as He wills.

From another place also you can see that He is not a being through whom another acts, but Himself acts. 'For who knows,' says the Apostle, 'what is in man except the spirit of man? So also no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God' (1 Cor 2:11).

The spirit of man, that is, the soul, needs no external impulse in order to know its own things. This is plain to everyone. Therefore the Holy Spirit also needs none in order to know the things of God. For, he says, the Holy Spirit knows the mysteries of God as the human soul knows its own mysteries.

If, then, in this matter He is not moved to action by anyone else, He knows the depths of God and acts without external influence in distributing gifts to the Apostles. Much more, then, is He Himself not in dependence.

Let us not be despondent, grieve, or say, 'Why did I receive this and not that?' Let us not demand an account from the Holy Spirit. If you know that He gives according to His providence, and understand that by the same providence He gives in a certain measure, then be content and rejoice in what you received.

Do not be saddened by what you did not receive. Rather, give thanks also that you did not receive what was beyond your strength" (Chrysostom).